Calculate Savings With Energy Star Appliances
By replacing your decades old appliances with new Energy Star labeled appliances, you can save more than 30% on your monthly electricity bills. Sometimes, these new energy efficient appliances save enough on energy bills that they pay for themselves within one or two years.
What is Energy Star?
The Energy Star program is a joint initiative from the US Department of Energy and US Environmental Protection Agency. Being part of this program helps us save energy and money and also protects environment. This program is not limited to the US only, but is supported internationally now.
Energy Star is a government-backed symbol which is used for energy-efficient products and practices. These products earn Energy Star labels only after meeting strict energy efficient guidelines.
This Energy Star label is designed and established to:
- Reduce the inefficient use of energy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and pollution.
- Help the consumer to identify and purchase energy efficient products. These energy efficient products help reduce electricity bills without compromising on features, performance, or comfort.
Energy Star gives different ratings to different appliances based upon their power efficiency. You can easily calculate savings with Energy Star appliances using energy saving calculations, which are described below. Appliance manufacturers are required to use standard tests to establish efficient use of energy by their products. The results of these tests are printed on the yellow Energy Star label and reflect the approximate amount of energy used by products, energy use of similar products, and an estimate of annual cost of operating.
Energy Star Appliances Save Energy, Money, and the Environment
The major part of your monthly energy bills is contributed by your home appliances such as clothes washer, dishwasher, refrigerator, and air conditioner. If all these appliances in your home are more than a decade old, you have bloated energy bills and you are wasting your money unknowingly.
Modern appliances are designed to meet strict energy efficiency standards and do not hog as much energy as the old appliances did. With passing time, these standards are getting stricter and with every new appliance, you are save more money. For instance, if you buy the most energy efficient refrigerator today, it will use less than half of the energy used by a twelve or more years old model.
Calculate Savings with Energy Star Appliances
It is quite difficult to exactly calculate savings with energy star appliances. The amount of savings depends upon how old your current appliances are. There are two figures of savings: when compared with your old appliances and when compared with other new, non-Energy Star products.
For instance, the latest Energy Star clothes washers are designed to use less water for delivering the best wash. These washers use less energy for heating water, so the savings apply to the cost of operating your water heater as well.
When calculated, these Energy Star clothes washers save around $50 annually on the utility bills over the non-Energy Star models. If you are using a product that is more than a decade old, you will save around $135 a year. If you are choosing an Energy Star refrigerator over a non-Energy Star refrigerator, you will be saving around $165 over the life of the refrigerator.
Energy Star TV
The television is like an important member of our homes. As we cannot do not without TV, the idea of having an Energy Star TV is brilliant. Using an Energy Star TV over a standard unit will help you save 30% energy per year. An Energy Star labeled TV should use 1 Watt or less in standby mode. When the TV is running in the normal mode, its energy requirements vary. It depends upon the screen size and the whether the unit is standard resolution, the type of backlighting (LED, plasma, or fluorescent), and the size of the TV.
Energy Star PC
The computers are the biggest energy savers today if they are Energy Star rated. A PC meeting the latest Energy Star specifications will use 30% to 60% less energy. The amount of energy saving depends greatly upon how you use it. For instance, writing an e-mail requires less energy than playing a graphics-heavy computer game. Again a traditional non-Energy Star rated monitor uses around 462 units of Energy while an Energy Star LCD monitor uses only around 36 units annually.
How to Calculate Savings with Energy Star Appliances using Simple Calculations
- Determine the units consumed by the product annually and multiply it with the cost of energy.
- Multiply this result with estimated life of the product with an average of ten years.
- Add this figure to the cost of the product. This is the gross holding cost of the product.
Repeat this procedure for the non-Energy Star product and compare both results to find out the savings.
Reference: https://www.energystar.gov
Image Credit: energystar.gov
Image Credit: inhabitat.com
